It was my second time at Tucson Meet Yourself, and this time, I wanted to focus on local indigenous food, something truly Sonoran. After studying the possibilities, my best options were Cafe Santa Rosa, Coyote Kitchen, the O'odham Ladies booth, or the San Xavier Cooperative Farm booth.
Cafe Santa Rosa (@cafesantarosa520) is a family-owned Native Cuisine Restaurant popover, also known as Indian Frybread, and it has a permanent South Tucson restaurant location.
Coyote Kitchen is a restaurant and gift shop in the San Xavier Plaza adjacent to the San Xavier del Bac Mission. It is known for its O'odham Frybread.
So, I chose the San Xavier Cooperative Farm (@sanxaviercoop) booth. I ordered a Ciolim or Cholla Bud Tamale with cheese and green chili. A cholla bud is the flowering part of the Cholla Cactus. And apparently, they are best picked right before they flower around March/April. To harvest, they use two sticks as chopsticks to remove the buds and place them in a wicker-style basket, where they are brushed around for about 30 seconds to remove the spines.
The tamale was a bit unique but in a good way! Some say the buds taste like an artichoke heart or asparagus, and I would agree. I did get a bit of that sense with this tamale. It was good! I ate it plain while standing off in the shade, and I would have liked it better with some salsa and salt. But I would absolutely eat it again. And eating something so familiar and indigenous to where we live is pretty amazing.
I also ordered a Mesquite cookie, which was a bit dry but had an earthly flavor I enjoyed. I washed it down with their Yellow Watermelon Lemonade made with the yellow watermelons grown on the farm.
I learned more from their website (www.sanxaviercoop.org).
"The San Xavier Cooperative Association is committed to healthy farming practices and growing traditional crops to support cultural and environmental values, as well as support economic development within the community."
"The San Xavier Cooperative Farm considers the following aspects (and others) of the Tohono O'odham Himdag, or Way of Life, to ensure that decisions in the farm's rehabilitation project are consistent with the culture."
"The Tohono O'odham have stewarded S-cu:k Son/Tucson lands for thousands of years, farming the Ali Akimel (Santa Cruz River) banks. At San Xavier Coop Farm, we continue our traditions of cultivating and wild-harvesting resilient and delicious desert foods such as tepary beans, 60-day corn, cholla buds, and mesquite."
So, thank you to The San Xavier Cooperative Farm for having a booth at Tucson Meet Yourself. It is a remarkable thing to be able to get in touch with the most historical food in the place where you were born. I feel this was the most Tucson (or S-cu:k Son) taste I could have had -- literally tasting the Sonoran desert.